Sunday, 7 December 2014

Another experiment with the ear harps, this time trying out silk thread as the string instead of nylon. The reasoning is that a lot of far eastern instruments use silk strings and I have found no way of getting them in this country, or even if they are used anymore. I approached a company that makes silk thread and asked for a strong thread that might be used to string an instrument, they sent me some samples and I tried them out, yes they were strong enough and yes they produced sound. So whilst waiting for my next project to surface I thought I would have a go with the silk threads and making my own wooden tuning pegs at the same time, carved in oak, they are okay, not perfect but they do work although they crucify my tennis elbow that is causing so much grief at the moment. The sound is very pure it doesn't have the richness and depth of the nylon but produces it's own unique sound, very clean. The wood is ash with lichen and moss on it for added interest and the stand also acts as the listening spur although of course you can hear sound anywhere on the wood.